Is Love Only a Human Thing?
by BenXGwen Lightning Warrior
Summary: John and Cortana explore thier relationship after The Battle for Earth. (A warning to all Trolls is given at the end of the first chapter.)
1. The Unsolvable Tangent (09-24 06:21:37)

Chapter One: The Unsolvable Tangent

John walked up on the main deck of Cairo Station. The deck looked like an anthill as soldiers scurried around their different stations. In the middle of the room was a new set of armor. It was green like the current Mk. VI that was on his muscular body now. Personally, he was relieved. The Mk. V was a better suit than the VI, but the Chief learned long ago not to complain. He just walked up to the middle of the room and let the technicians replace his armor. Once the Mk. VI armor was removed, John felt he was exposed but hid this well behind a mask of unreadable expression. Once the new Mark VII was completely equipped, John felt at home again, but then, a part of his mind felt cold and icy. The strange presence in his mind seemed to make itself at home and seemed to smile. "There's a lot of room in here." The AI said with a hint of amusement in her voice. John just glared at her in his mind. Then, there was an explosion. "Covenant forces have infiltrated the station!" John looked around as Johnson handed him an M-9 pistol. "Give them hell, Chief." He said with a faint smile. John just nodded and walked down the passage out to the air locks. As he walked, John ran through the slew of enemy with a little trouble. As John was running, he looked over into the hanger bay and saw a strange spiked elongated oval. The AI scanned the odd looking device and cursed. "It's an antimatter bomb." John sighed and ran to the bomb as it ticked down. John put his hand on the blinking red light. It turned blue. "How much time was left?" John asked calmly. Cortana sighed. "You don't want to know." She said with a grave tone. "Let's give it back to them." Cortana's code flickered inside herself, similar to a human holding their breath. John pulled the bomb to the air lock and pushed it through. As he fell out with the bomb, John reactivated the bomb and pushed off of it back to the Cairo Station. The bomb exploded and wounded the enemy flagship.

The shockwave knocked Master Chief out and sent him tumbling to Earth. With the new Mr. VII, Cortana was no longer helplessly trapped in the suit with nothing to do but hope her human currier and his unrealistic luck allowed for him to survive. She tapped into the suit's micro thrusters wired into the nuclear generator as one of the new upgrades to the MJOLNIR Armor and slowed their decent enough so John would only suffer a little bruising upon impact. "Three…two…one…" She grunted as the landing made her consciousness flicker as her chip vibrated in its supposedly firmly locked slot in the back of the armor's helmet. Cortana checked John's vials, just in case her rushed, even for a "smart" AI such as herself, calculations proved to be wrong. She was intrigued when she read John's brainwaves. Her AI mind reduced everything to complex mathematics. Even though her mind was the computer version of a human brain, she still processed data as dizzyingly complex formulas. So, when a wave in John's mind was rendered as an undefined function of Tangent, or so Cortana perceived it to be, she was understandably baffled and worried. Had Cortana been listening, instead of fretting over John's physical state, she would have heard John mumble her name right as the unlikely function appeared.

John sat up and looked around. His body felt as if it had been thrown through two brick walls and finally stopped at a third by an Elite. His hand instantly flew to the slot in the back of his head. _Good. Package is safe._ The Chief thought to himself. Unbeknownst to John, Cortana was glaring at him from inside his head but kept her peace. She hated being thought of as just a disposable device no different from a portable storage drive. John got up and started walking as Cortana checked their position. "Civilization is-" She was cut off as the sound of Wraith plasma cannons echoed in John's ears. He glared in the direction of the blasts and started sprinting to the site as pictures of destruction flashed through his mind. Even with John's advanced augmentations, it took the Spartan nearly half an hour to reach the battlefield.

Once there, John found a hide behind a slab of broken reinforced concrete, the ends of exposed rebar scorched and melted to show it had been grazed by the fury of a Covent plasma turret. From this spot, Master Chief surveyed the field. A squad of marines was pinned by Grunts who had taken cover behind another section of concrete. Their blue-armored Elite taskmaster was looking around for stragglers who appeared to be shooting from above. Cortana smiled to herself. She had found some interesting new toys in the suit when she discovered the thrusters that saved the Chief's life. She quickly programmed the thermal crystals in the suit and deployed them. All John saw was a pinkish purple flurry of projectiles shoot out from the top of his vision. John quickly whirled to face in the direction of the Needler rounds but saw no one behind him. When John turned back around, he saw the squad of Grunts ripped to shreds by the mystery Needler rounds. Blue blood coated the ground in puddles around the fallen Unggoy. The Elite turned toward the sound of his annoying underlings and growled in frustration before he ran at the marines as they fired their weapons at the creature, but the Elite's energy field kept the warrior from harm. Just as the blue clad alien was about to finish of the marines who were out or low on ammo, two shots rang out in rapid succession. The first shot was a through and through of the alien's temple. As the creature started to fall, the second ripped into the Elite's chest.

The marine squad turned toward the shots as John stated to walk toward the men. Most of them stood, mouths agape, at the seven foot tall super soldier. The ones that didn't stand started whispering among themselves. "That's a Spartan." One whispered. Another said, "I heard they're machines, like T-800s." The leader of the squad glared at the man. "This isn't a movie, Hollywood. Now, shut up!" The man dubbed Hollywood shut his yap, but John could see searching eyes in the squad leader now, as if the man were mentally testing his fellow marine's theory in his mind. "Let's move." The Chief ordered as he looked around. "Sir?" The squad leader asked as he looked at one of his men who seemed to be held together with biofoam and field dressings. "Radcliff, give this to my wife." The critically injured marine reached in and weakly grabbed a note and a ring from a pocket on his fatigues before he handed it to Radcliff. The squad leader glared at his fallen brother-in-arms as if to say, "No man left behind". The solder gave a slight, respectful nod. The squad leader understood and regrettably looked away before he looked back. "Godspeed…" He said calmly with an angry look in his eyes.

The squad moved on and followed the path of carnage the Wraith left in its wake. John's mind remained alert to his surroundings, but the Spartan had been struck hard by what the dying marine told his CO. Contrary to popular belief, John was human. He just ignored his emotions because he was trained to think they hindered battle performance. Now, he saw the truth. These men were fighting for more than the UNSC. Each one had a personal emotional stake in this war with the ideology-crazed Covenant. They had someone back home, waiting patiently for the hopeful return of the soldier fighting now in this hell hole for something bigger than a single government entity. John suddenly felt shame at this realization. The marines that marched behind him had someone to look forward to when this war was done and nothing but a black mark against the scheme of human history. John, on the other hand, knew nothing but combat and suddenly found that he was wishing for more than just the life of a soldier as he marched on through the destroyed, but largely clear, path left by the Covenant tank.

The men had been walking for close to an hour when John heard the whine of Wraith engines. He balled up a held fist in a "halt" motion. The men quickly took position behind various hides, and John bent into a crouch behind a felled wall and waited for the war machine to pass him. Before Cortana could stop the Spartan, he jumped onto the Wraith. The marine platoon took that signal and started to fire on the tank from all directions. The confused operator didn't know where to fire first and didn't have time to figure it out before the "Demon" kicked his ass. John yanked the Elite operator out of the tank and threw him to ground as the Elite cursed The Human Demon until the marines gladly mopped up with cold eyes. "My, you work fast." Cortana told him. His face turned into a dark scowl. "I'm the best at what I do, and what I do isn't very nice." He told her calmly. John could feel the AI's sadness somehow when he said that, and it caused him to stop and think. _Am I still human?_ The thought generated an emotion John rarely felt: fear. The Spartan had seen a lot of scary shit in wartime, but the thought of sacrificing his Humanity for the UNSC was perhaps scarier than facing down any army of Hunters and/or gold Elites.

A tender voice brought the Spartan back from the brink. "John…" At first, the Chief thought it was Dr. Catharine Halsey, his surrogate "mother". The voice sure sounded like her. When John came to himself again and cleared his mind, however, the voice became more defined in his ears, and he recognized Cortana's voice as the sound blasted at him from his helmet speakers. "Damn it, John! Get your ass up!" John blinked. If he didn't know for a fact Cortana was a computer program, he would swear she was crying. It was then John realized how Cortana saw him. She did not see him as a mindless beast with only a single directive of "Kill the enemy." She saw him as more, much more. For the first time since his childhood, John felt his lips form into a smile. _I do have someone to fight for,_ John thought to himself. _Her name is Cortana._

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 **Author's Note: I just wanted to try my hand at a Halo fic. I do not eat, breath, and sleep Halo, so nit picky Trolls will have Carrier Forms sent after them with no mercy.**


	2. Hope Against Logic

Chapter Two: Hope against Logic

It had been years since that day during the Battle for Earth, and Cortana was still dedicating precious processing power to the Unsolvable Tangent that she interpreted every time the Chief thought of her. In fact, it was the only thing that kept her deepest files secure from the Gravemind when she was abandoned on High Charity. The monster continued to try and infect her. She held on. In fact, she gave Gravemind a few mental bruises when she could. This only irritated the creature and made him start throwing her code around and rearranging it. She felt so weak when Chief found her. She could barely stand to greet him, but she forced herself to.

Chief had been through utter Hell trying to get Cortana back. After being away from her so long, his mind started to play tricks on him. He would hear her in his head happily laughing one minute. Then, he would hear her sobbing and cursing him the next. It would have driven him to the nuthouse had he not known that it was just his mind. When John got on High Charity, the thing was infested with Flood. They attacked him with bravado and strength he'd never seen. Then, it was like Gravemind and Cortana were battling for his mind. Only this Cortana seemed like she was falling apart, and it made John furious. He ripped through the bastards. "You fucks want to take me down? I'm not going to fall easily!" He growled at them as he plowed through the monsters in search of his Cortana. When he found her, she looked sickly, but she managed to stand and look at him. "When I make a promise…" John said as he downloaded her into his head. "…you keep it."

As soon as he slid her chip into the slot in the back of his helmet, Chief noticed something was different about her. She wasn't as chipper as her usual self. "No quips about my brain's emptiness?" He asked her with a faint smile that quickly vanished, replaced by a worried frown as John's concern for his AI partner surfaced. Reading his brain activity, Cortana cut the Spartan off before he could say anything. "I'm fine, John." She said calmly as she fought back a wave of disorganized code like one might fight pain. "Gravemind just threw my code around a little, nothing time won't heal." John could tell by the hesitation in her voice. She wasn't fine. AI could put together thoughts at blinding speed. The fact that each word was slightly slower than her usual speech made that clear to John, but he decided not to press the issue and concentrated on finding a way off the floating God-forsaken place.

After fighting through hordes of Flood, Gravemind crawled in a sickly fashion up to them and roared as it sensed the presence of Cortana in John's suit. Master Chief shouldered his MA5B sub-machinegun and let the parasite eat lead. As one tentacle fell from the hail of bullets, Flood joined with the Gravemind and allowed it to regenerate the lost limb "SHIT!" Cortana and Chief said in unison. Then, John noticed something disgusting about the parasite that was useful and gave him an idea. "Cortana, blow a hole in that thing with a Needler explosion!" Cortana armed the crystals and released them. As the ammunition exploded, the creature roared in pain, but Chief filled the wound with grenades before the monster could respond. Then, the grenades detonated and BOOM! Gravemind was no more. "That was more fun than I've had in a while." Cortana said as Chief carried them to a ship. While the two of them were making an escape, a camera on the ship captured them leaving and the Elite Fleet Commander growled. "Take them out!"

Cortana was the first to notice the Covenant fighters on their tail. "We've got company, Chief!" She said Master Chief didn't even nod. He just turned the ship to attack position and began to fire at the fighters. "Cortana, take the guns!" He ordered as she slipped into the fighter's systems and started to make space dust and scrap metal out of the fleet sent to destroy them. That is until things got weird. The control panels for the guns when from Cortana blue to red. She started yelling at the John about all the disrespect and injustice she received because she was an AI. John was blown away by this. "Cortana, what are you yelling about?" He asked, getting more worried by the second about his partner and friend. Then, a blow to the ship's right thruster brought them back to the dogfight they were in the middle of.

"Gravemind did something to you." John's eyes went wide and settled on anger at the realization. "I used a lot of power to keep him out of my systems. I just need to recharge." Master Chief shook his head. "'Recharge' my ass." He growled at her with an unseen glare. "John, you've suffered so much. I don't want to add to it." She said quietly as John took his anger out by shooting down enemy fighters. "I've had bad news before. What is it?" The Spartan could feel her presence turn away from his mind as if she was putting her back to him. He could feel her form shake in his mind before she spoke. Her tone was now heavy and sad. "I'm dying, John." The words slammed the Master Chief into the seat of the ship like twenty tons of concrete. John grunted under the weight of Cortana's words and managed, "What did you say?" Bad news normally didn't hit the super soldier harder than a Scorpion Tank round, but the words that came out of his speakers did just that. _Dying? How can an AI die?_ John asked in mild confusion and panic.Cortana seemed to walk closer to the speakers as she tried in vain to comfort him with a touch. _Damn it!_ The AI cursed her digital body. "AIs can cease function John, but they can't 'die' like organics. We think ourselves to death." John sighed. He had forgotten that Cortana was a computer. She had become so much more.

"We're going to find a way to fix this!" Cortana sighed. "John, it can't be-" She stopped when she saw John's vitals spike in anger. She sat back, near the neural interface and began to think about her looming fate. Cortana was logical. The Chief's hope for a cure was a kind gesture, but her logic subroutines told her that John's "hope" was the beginning stage of grief: denial. Then, her code flickered strangely as she began to imagine what it was like to be human. Human bodies had an expiration date. She knew that, but at the average of ten times her life span, it was a dream she longed for. Naturally, she kept these manufactured fantasies which some would say was an early sign of Rampancy, created by her matrix, to herself. She was drawn out of her silent thoughts by John's voice. "You taught me there's more to life than fighting. That's a miracle, and with my luck, we will find a way to fix you." John knew it was the grief talking, but a part of him held out hope that they would find a cure before it was too late. The UNSC would have to get along without Sierra-117 for a little time as he and Cortana searched for the cure she needed. That would be his final decision on the matter.

After what felt like days of searching, a planet came up on scope. Chief had yanked Cortana's chip from his helmet in an effort to slow her deteriorating state. As John looked at the readings from the fighter's scanners, he noticed it kept referring to a "world of the gods". "That's odd." Chief mumbled as he flew to the coordanates provided by the computer.

When he reached the site, there was nothing but darkness. No stars or anything showed through the viewport. All was black. It was as if the universe reverted to the primordial blackness from wince it came. "Cortana…" Chief was hesitant to put her back in his helmet, but the Spartan needed her help. He couldn't make heads or tails of where they were, and being without direction scared John. He always had orders to follow as a soldier. Now, he was literally and figuratively lost. Cortana looked around and couldn't believe what she was seeing. "We're in a Slipspace Gate. Just keep moving forward. We should come out of the other side soon." _Not soon enough…_ John thought as he heard her voice grow quieter with every word she spoke.

On the other side, there were no words to try and describe the sights that went before the Master Chief's visor. The world around him glowed with vibrant greens, browns, and blues. After walking for what seemed like an hour, maybe two, John came upon a crashed Covenant troopship. The Master Chief reloaded his weapons with fresh clips and a scanning eye before continued to move. He moved at a brisk pace but still slow enough to be ready for an ambush should one come. The Chief was beginning to hope all the Covenant aboard their ship had died. These pleasant thoughts were smashed to pieces when John heard a Grunt about three hundred feet to his right start laughing to his comrades. "Ha ha. We found Paradise," The diminutive alien squeaked. "The Prophets were wrong!"

John moved into the view of the Grunt and smirked under his visor as the creature readied a plasma pistol with its oversized hands shaking. "Demon?! You can't be here." It said, too stunned to fire. "If you're here, that means…" "Welcome to Hell, Motherfucker!" The Chief said as he ran into the Covenant camp and started mowing down the unsuspecting troops. A few Stealth Elites activated their camouflage and disappeared into the environment. "I'll chase them later." Chief growled, his mind completely focused on Cortana as he charged into a structure that was a meter and a half away and half sunk into the ground. He looked around and felt something pulling him down the left corridor when he came to a split.

The helmet mounted lights came on as he continued to follow the rapidly darkening tunnel. When Master Chief reached what seemed like a dead end he punched the wall in frustration. The wall began to glow orange as strange glyphs appeared on it. John was shocked when he realized he could read the glyphs. They read as follows. "Welcome, Reclaimer. What you seek is inside. Go." Master Chief readied his machine gun and slowly stepped forward as the wall parted to let him through. An artificial voice rang through the walls as a strange machine rose from the stone floor in the back to the room, "Put your Ancillia in the Anticomposer, and it shall be like you, Reclaimer." Master Chief wanted to shoot the voice for referring to Cortana as an "it", but he didn't argue with it and put her chip in the odd machine. After a few moments of unparalleled anxiety, John heard a woman clear her throat and looked up to see the source of the voice was a woman with electric blue hair in marine garb smiling at him. "Hello, John." The man looked at the woman in shock. "Cortana?!"

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	3. Joys and Sorrows of Humanity

Chapter Three: The Joys and Sorrows of Humanity

The first thing Cortana felt was the soft kiss of a breeze on the back of her neck. The sensation made her shiver and smile like a child who just discovered a lost toy. John watched as Cortana's hands went over the exposed portions of her body not covered by the marine field uniform the Forerunner machine gave her. He had to smile. She was like a kid in a candy store. Everything made her mind explode with shock at the incoming information from her senses. No wonder humans were so dependent on their sense of touch. There was so much information to be gathered from the skin. It was incredible! Then, she saw John in his armor and felt fear. The emotion was odd because she wasn't afraid of John as an AI. In fact, she enjoyed the jump from a ship to the suit's systems.

John knew she would notice him eventually, but the look on Cortana's face when her eyes lifted up to look at him made the Chief's heart shatter. _She's afraid of me_. He thought to himself sadly. When Cortana's expression perked up into a small smile, John felt relief run through him. "I'm not scared of you, John." She said as she put a hand on his armored elbow. When he didn't react, she remembered most of his senses did not translate through the armor. "The armor is intimidating." John laughed hollowly. "That's what it was built for." He told her as she took a few steps toward him and fell. "Easy, Cortana," he told her as he let her lean on him for support. "Walking isn't as easy as humans make it out to be." She smiled up at him as they started for the exit.

By the time the soldier and the former AI made it to the mouth of the Forerunner structure, Cortana's ambulatory skills improved greatly so that she now stood and walked on her own with only a little uneasiness in her gate. They looked around as Master Chief remembered the Stealth Elites he left in a hurry to cure Cortana. Now, he cursed his impatience and looked around the compound with searching eyes. Cortana armed herself with the Chief's M-9 and looked around for the tell that came as an Elite under Active Camouflage moved, and the Active Camouflage tried to adjust to the continually changing environment. The discrepancy caused the light to shimmer and momentarily expose the target. She smiled, lifted the pistol, and took a shot. John flinched at the sound and turned to see an Elite growl and gurgle as it fell, dead. John looked back. His visor hid a pleasantly surprised smile. "Remind me not to get you mad." He said calmly. She smirked. Then, the chief saw a shimmer behind her. The Elite charged her, but it received lead for its attempt on Cortana's life. "Let's get back." John said as he and Cortana walked back to the ship.

"Damn it!" She growled. "I can't interface with the ship's systems directly." She said as her hands flew across the control with a mix of panic and confusion in thier motion. John looked at her. "You can do it." He said as he put an armored hand on her shoulder. She looked at the now foreign controls and closed her eyes. Old instincts guided her as she ordered the troopship to initiate its Slipspace drive. In response, the drive whined to life as Cortana's new heart jumped in excitement. "I've still got it." She whispered to herself as she pumped her left fist in the air with excitement. "What did I tell you?" Chief asked as he popped the seals on his helmet and pulled it off. Cortana's breath hung into her throat as the Chief turned to reveal his face to her. His eyes were piercing blue. He had scarred eyes, the eyes of a man who had seen too much combat, and dark hair. Worn features showed the effects of years of battle on her Spartan. Years of narrow escapes and too many near death experiences to count took their toll on the man. A strange attractiveness was in that weathered face as Cortana took in the Chief's features for the first time. She reached up and gently touched his face with a small smile. "You don't know how long I've wanted to do that." She told him as the view screen of the Covenant vessel melted into the vibrant blue and white of Slipspace. It was then when it hit Cortana. She would now need to go into Cryosleep with John. The thought scared her. John could feel her apprehension and gently took her hand. "I'll be right here the whole way." He said gently as he pointed to the Cryopod next to hers. As he said that, they laid in their respective pods. Seconds later, Cryosleep took them.

They say in Cryosleep everything but the primitive part of the brain shuts down. The whole experience for Cortana was a bit of a flashback to when she was an AI. Cortana's mind actually left her body through the monitor systems of her pod and took control of the ship. She guided the ship to UNSC controlled space and was met by a gruff but definitely feminine voice. "This is Captain Miranda Keys of the ship _In Amber Clad_. Identify yourself or be fired upon." Cortana couldn't help smiling. "This is Cortana with Sierra-117 requesting emergency pick up." Cortana got stunned but expected silence from the other end. Then…

Miranda couldn't believe her ears. The Spartan and his AI partner had been AWOL for three standard months, presumed KIA. Now, they showed up on her scopes as a Covenant ship. "All troops to Hanger 11. Possible Covenant boarding party inbound. I say again. Possible Covenant boarding party inbound." Keys called over the ship-wide intercom. "Cortana, land the ship on hanger 11." Miranda ordered. "Acknowledged, Captain." Cortana said before her mind went back to her pod, woke her body, and started the process to wake John. "Chief, we have a welcoming committee." John jumped to feet and felt a by now familiar nausea come over his body. After it passed, he put on his helmet and gave Cortana a sight nod as the woman took an MA5B from the weapon rack, loaded it, and held the weapon with unnatural ease. _Keys is going to have a field day over this._ Cortana thought to herself with a slight shiver as she was bombarded with at least a million ways the interaction with Keys could go bad.

As steel echoed in Cortana's ears, she held her MA5B at the ready in preparation for the ensuing firefight that would undoubtedly come once the men saw her with the Chief instead of just him with her voice as it greeted them from his helmet. It was almost as she expected as the ramp dropped down. As she and John disembarked from their improvised mode of transport, Marines had their guns pointed at the pair, but MJOLNIR armor blocked their view of the strange woman. "To get to her, you have to go through me!" The threatening declaration from the Chief made most of the hardened Marines back off. All, that is, except for the captain. She walked up to Cortana and glared at the woman. "Who are you?" The captain got in her face, and the two things that kept John from ripping Keys' arm off were his respect from the chain of command and for women. "I was Navigation AI for the _Pillar of Autumn_ , but we were stranded on a Forerunner Shield World. There, we found an artifact that transformed me into a human." Miranda began to pace as she considered Cortana's story.

"Report to Office of Naval Intelligence for debriefing." She said in a commanding tone. Hearts pounded in the chests of both Cortana and John. The ONI was notorious for being brutal with any AIs they considered "compromised". Usually they called AIs compromised when they started to show emotion. Emotion in AIs was a roadblock to efficiency. Emotions clouded judgment in their eyes, so the more machine-like a person or AI was, the better. "No." Chief said coldly as he took off his helmet and gave Keys a full glare. "Don't. Bring. Her. In. Don't ask me to because that is one order I cannot follow." Keys seemed to smile at that. "She will be more use as a cadaver anyway." That was all the Spartan could take. As his face formed into an irate glare, most of the Marines in the room ran as if the Master Chief was an incendiary bomb. At least emotionally, he was a bomb ready to explode on the Captain. "Do you even know what they will do to her?!" He growled. It took most of his consentration to keep from ending the Captain right there. "She is human!" He yelled. This took Keys off guard and made the young woman laugh. "She is just a computer program who now has a human shell." Cortana slapped the woman. "Your father would be ashamed." Cortana said as she too turned her glare on the young captain. "He saw me as a member of the crew, not just a computer. In fact, he taught me I had value. I will be forever grateful for that."

Miranda seemed to ponder these words for a moment. Then, she pointed her gun at Cortana. "You shoot her," John warned. "There will be no end to the pain I'll give you, ma'am." Keys' face lit up with realization, and she laughed at John to his face. "You fell in love with a stupid computer?!" She grinned at him. John gave Cortana a subtle "little help?" nod. Cortana took the hint and slugged Keys so hard in the face she was out cold before her head hit the deck. Cortana marveled at her newfound strength and looked at her fists in shock. _That Forerunner Ancillia did tell John I would have a body like his, but does that mean I'm like a Spartan now?_ Cortana asked herself as the ship's onboard AI appeared on a holopad in front of them, designation: Lucy. "Protocols dictate I am to take you to Lord Hood himself for assessment Cortana." John glared daggers at the _In Amber Clad_ 's onboard construct. She looked like Cortana but her eyes and hair were Rampancy red.

As it laughed maniacally, Chief was reminded of 343 Guilty Spark. That insane Monitor killed Sergeant Avery Johnson to try and force the Chief's hand. That's when he knew exactly what ONI was going to do to Cortana. Lord Hood was attempting to merge Human and Forerunner technologies to combat Rampancy, but Cortana offered a more intriguing means of ending Rampancy with her newly acquired human form. Lord Hood was a butcher in the worse sense when it came to AIs, especially Cortana and her other "sisters" created from mapping Doctor Halsey's brain digitally and imprinting it onto a blank AI chip. Chief was brought out of these thoughts as he heard Miranda groan and a hammer cock back with a soft _Click!_ The AI was just a distraction. Cortana heard the sound too, jumped out of the way, but got clipped in the shoulder. Cortana held back tears as her landing on the deck jarred her body and sent waves of pain through her shoulder. "Mother fucker, that hurt!" The woman yelled. Master Chief wanted to make Miranda's head imitate an owl's, but he pushed aside his thoughts for vengeance and began to patch up Cortana. _Lord Hood will die._ John thought darkly as he field dressed her wound.

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	4. The Safety of Memories

Chapter Four: The Safety of Memories

By the time John got Cortana back to her feet, every gun and soldier on the ship had their guns pointed at him. "Don't do this, Sierra-117. You are a war legend. Don't throw a reputation like that away just for love." Maranda told him as she got in her hands and knees before she slowly stood. John's mind was running at high speed as he tried to think of a plan. _If we could just get to an unoccupied hanger…_ He thought. He looked around and saw his chance: a gap in the line wide enough for him and Cortana to slip through. With a burst of adrenaline, Master Chief felt his body enter "Spartan Time". In a flash, John put on his helmet and dashed out of the room. In the adrenaline haze, he forgot to check on Cortana. He was relieved and a little surprised when he heard her voice in his helmet. "Chief, what was that?! Did we go through a warp of some kind?" She asked him. To be honest, the event scared her a little. One minute, time paced itself normally. The next, she felt as if she was part of a slow motion video playback.

As the adrenaline started to recede, Cortana and Chief boarded a Longsword with Cryopods in it. Cortana quickly got to work starting up the engines while Chief kept the solders busy with cover fire. As they left the In Amber Clad, John thought he heard a tone play in his speakers "Oly Oly Oxen Free". The Spartan shook his head in disbelief. "That's impossible!" He said with a little agitation in his voice. "What is it, Chief?" John debated telling Cortana about the code. "I got a signal from somewhere." He put his hand on the Longsword's flight console and sent the information to the navigation hub to be analyzed. After a few minutes, he heard Cortana gasp. "This can't be right." She yelled. _Reach was glassed years ago!_ She thought in shock. "The signal is coming from Reach!" John too was surprised, though he kept it under a thick layer of insulation. _If there are any survivors, it's worth a look_. John thought as he looked at Cortana, who was heading aft for the Cryotubes. John was surprised by this but didn't voice his concern.

As Cryosleep took them, Cortana felt her mind transfer to the ship. What she found once in the ship's systems made her smile. A miniature Slipspace drive was wired into this Longsword's systems and easily programmable for her in her current form. She smiled. "Slipspace drive online. Calculations complete. Impel!" She said just before the viewport showed Slipspace. Cortana giggled as she "looked" around the ship. "Never thought I'd say this," she mumbled. "Thank you for secret military craft." Her consciousness was suddenly drawn to an alarm on John's Cryopod. His neural activity started to fluctuate wildly, and his body started thrashing in its confines. She knew what it was, and she silently cursed the UNSC. _I always thought human dreams were interesting_. She thought. Now, to see them affecting her Spartan so drastically, she didn't find them appealing; she found them frightening. With nothing she could do to help him, Cortana reluctantly returned to her cryopod and waited out the rest of the trip to Reach.

The Longsword started thawing them a few days later when they came to the gravity well of Reach. Cortana shivered and groaned as she woke from the state of hibernation. _Holy shit. That was rough_. Cortana thought as she started the revival of her soldier. With a hiss of decompression, the pod opened and John looked at Cortana with a shake of his head. "No matter how many times I go into cryo, it never gets easier." John said before he walked to the bridge of the Longsword and looked out the viewport. "What secrets do you hide, Reach?" Cortana asked as she guided the ship to the surface of the planet where the message came from. Strangely, there was a small portion where the planet was not dead and in fact looked untouched by the Covenant incursion that doomed most of the planet's biosphere, including his friends and comrades in the Spartan II Program. If there was any chance his family was still alive, it was worth looking into.

With a rough landing, the Longsword brought them to the edge of the pristine area. "Stay on guard, Cortana. We don't know who or what could be waiting for us." She nodded and looked ahead with her MA5B gun at the ready just in case. That was when a Covenant troopship rode overhead. "Why would they send troops…?" Cortana smiled. "There must be a colony of survivors!" Cortana said with hopeful eyes. Master Chief hid a frown behind his visor. Too many times he'd seen the possibility of a rescue mission turn into a trap laid for those who dared to hope for a recovery of comrades and brothers in arms. "The first thing I learned in training was deception, Cortana. Don't trust everything you see." He warned as they walked on into the wilderness.

As they continued to walk, John recognized where they were and glared into the forest. "Watch your step. There are booby traps all over the place." He told her calmly with a stern look under his visor. She nodded with a steel look and looked at the ground with searching eyes. It wasn't any sight that brought her gun to bear however. She heard a squeaky, complaining voice and froze. She smiled when she saw two Grunts and an Elite step out into view. Cortana was about to shoot the aliens when she felt a taught line behind her and smiled. She jumped over the line and carefully watched for her time to activate the trap. As soon as the Elite walked over an old net, Cortana smiled and cut the line. With a growl of anger, the Elite was drawn up in a net and hoisted into the air on a tree branch. "Let me down, Reclaimer!" The Elite growled in heavily accented English. She walked up to the Elite and glared at him. "How do I know what your intentions are?" Cortana asked as she walked out of her hiding spot on a large amount of trust in the warrior. The male smiled at her but felt a cold barrel on the back of his head. "Touch her, and you will die." John warned. "I serve Thel 'Vadam. I will not harm either of you. You have my honor as a warrior." The Elite said with a polite bow. "Follow me." He said. "I can take you to safety." John nodded but kept his gun ready, just in case. "Lead on." John said with a cold tone.

The Elite walked on with his small contingent of Grunts. The fact that Elites hated the small imps was not lost on Cortana or Chief. He glared at their guide and looked at Cortana before he gave her a slight nod. "Say 'hi' to Truth for us." Cortana said calmly as she killed the Elite and his vanguard of Grunts. "We'll find our own way, sir." Chief said to the fallen soldier calmly before he and Cortana continued on toward the settlement they both hoped was standing somewhere in the untouched region of Reach. "We need to keep moving and move quickly." Cortana said calmly with a glare as she and John looked around. "The bunker where Dr. Halsey kept me until we met should still be standing." Cortana suggested with a smile. The Chief nodded slowly and started toward that bunker.

A few hours later, the two came to a clearing and found a battle raging outside the bunker. John stopped just outside the battle and watched before he found a window in a lapse in guard. Master Chief smiled. Human or alien, behavior rarely changed. He smiled at Cortana and counted out to three. Then, together they charged. Guns blasted, and screams filled the air. In the mêlée, John thought he saw a few Spartans fighting with him as they pushed the enemy back. "You stay out of our home, assholes!" John blinked at the voice that came from the other suit. _Fred…It can't be!_ John thought in shock as he filed that question away for a time when it could be asked. For now, he concentrated on clearing the Safe Zone. The covenant were putting up quite the fight but why? As John put lead in one Elite's head, he heard the hiss of plasma as it left the barrel of a plasma pistol. A second later, the Master Chief's shield collapsed and he growled in anger. Cortana blasted a hole through the Grunt's head before it could kill John. Then, she let her anger loose on the unfortunate Covenant bastards who apparently were not familiar with the phrase "Hell hath no fury as a woman scorned." She went hand to hand with Elites and Grunts alike.

The Spartans were stunned as they watched Cortana fight. "Who's the new girl?" Linda asked as she watched the battle through her scope and watched the carnage the woman left in her wake. Linda would have shuttered with the prospect of the new Spartan strengthened with MJNIOR Armor if she would not have been zoned in on the battle. The Spartans cleaned up quickly with the arrival of John and the new girl. When the smoke cleared and the bunker was once again safe, a chorus of whistles echoed through the air. John and Cortana faced down the barrels of multiple weapons. "Who's your friend?" Linda chipped with a bit of jealousy in her voice.

John shook his head. He had no idea where to begin. "Look. It's a long story. The short version is Cortana was an AI. We found an artifact that turned her into a Spartan." Fred chuckled at this. "What was the mission, John? The UNSC doesn't care about AIs or us." John took his helmet off and glared at Fred. "There was no mission, Fred. I had to save my partner from Rampancy." He said with mild anger that made the pitch get lower as he spoke. "When I came back, the UNSC thanked me for my years of service by trying to kill us." Fred nodded. "The feeling is mutual among all of us." He said calmly. Fred then smiled at Cortana. "Follow me, miss. You must be starving." Linda tried to stop him. "I wouldn't try to hit on her." She warned. Fred smiled. He then saw the way John was trying to melt him with a glare. "I see. I'm sorry, John." As John and Cortana followed the rest of his brothers and sisters, a voice echoed through the halls. "Hello, John and Cortana," it said with a happy tone. Cortana's eyes widened. "Dr. Halsey?!"

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	5. Firsts

Chapter Five: Firsts

As Cortana walked further into the bunker, strange noises began to sound out from her abdominal area, and she felt an annoying but not painful sensation in the same general area. Her mind was awash with questions. "How did you survive the glassing?" She asked her "mother" with a perplexed look. "You need to eat, Cortana. Then, I'll answer your questions." The doctor responded as she looked back at John, who had just a trace of worry in his face. Cortana realized how strange and perhaps stupid her next question would sound, but Cortana asked anyway. "What's 'eat'?" Fred let out a small chuckle. "Chow time…is…you know? I never really thought about it before." Fred conceded as he scratched the back of his head in thought. Dr. Halsey smiled at Cortana. "It's how your new body gets fuel." She explained as Cortana nodded.

When they came near the dinning room, John and Cortana were swamped with the sweet symphony of odors that came with fresh cooked food. John sat down in a chair and had to guide Cortana to a sitting position in the chair next to him. Cortana looked at the food spread about the table and determined to try all of it. She piled her plate high with a little bit of everything. This made the natural born humans in the room smile in surprise. "If you eat all that, you're gonna be sick." Linda warned. Cortana nodded in acknowledgment and copied the Spartans as they used the different utensils. As she ate, Cortana noticed that everyone seemed to be staring at her. Dr. Halsey looked at the woman and shook her head. "It's very rude to eat with your elbows on the table." The doctor explained. Cortana quickly moved her arms to a suitable position and continued eating. _Why is arm position part of etiquette?_ Cortana thought in surprise.

As she ate, Cortana found the new sensation of taste absolutely dazzling. For the most part, everything that crossed her curious pallet was met with happiness, but there were a few things that she had to fight to get down. These foods were often met with grins and smirks from the Spartans and Dr. Halsey. Finally, Cortana asked, "What's so funny?" Even stoic John had the ghost of a smile on his face. "We can definitely tell when you don't like something." Fred told her as he copied her face. The look pulled a laugh out of her. The strange sound made Cortana blush furiously and cover her mouth in confusion and embarrassment. John put a hand on her shoulder. "Glad to see you're enjoying yourself." John told her. _That was laughter?_ Cortana thought as the group got up and started cleaning up the food.

John walked up to the doctor as the last of the dishes were being put away. "How did you survive?" He asked her. The woman's weathered features darkened with sadness, and she looked at John with a shiver. "In the bottom of the bunker was an ancient Precursor shield unit. I managed to reactivate it before the glassing was complete and preserve a section the planet. Since then, I've been calling Spartans home with the old code." She said with a smile. John nodded and looked over at Cortana. "She seems to be adjusting well, but I need to scan her body to see just how much of her body is different from normal humans." John felt a claw go through him. "She is human. It doesn't matter how she became human." John growled at her with a glare and shaking fists of fury. Dr. Halsey shivered and sighed. "I'm sorry John. I could have phrased that better. You both are human. I just need to check on her to make sure she's healthy." The doctor explained as John nodded.

Cortana finally got a good look at herself in a full-length mirror after she went to her room. She had bright blue eyes the same color as her code when she was an AI, black shoulder-length hair which surprised her because she thought it would blue like her eyes, a curvy slim figure, and an inviting but confident aura. "I look good." Cortana said to herself with a smile on her face. That's when Doctor Halsey walked in and smiled. "How's it feel to be human?" Cortana smiled. "It's amazing. I just feel a little strange because of all the new experiences." Cortana told the older woman with a smile as Catherine pulled out a scanner and went over Cortana's body with it. The doctor's face contorted in confusion. "Your bones are infused with carbon nanotubes and diamond strands. Your muscles are reinforced in a similar way." The doctor scratched her chin in curiosity as she looked at the scans. Cortana rolled her eyes at the doctor. "I know that. The Anti-Composer gave me a human body like John's with the same enhancements." She growled. "Stop treating me like I'm a damn experiment!" Cortana's growled, pissed. Before the girl could go into a full tirade, Cortana passed out from lack of sleep.

As Cortana fell asleep, she went into a dream. Confused by the dream and the fact that she was aware she was dreaming, Cortana tried to get up and move only to find her body chained to a wall. "Where am I?" The woman asked as she looked around. "Hello, human construct." Cortana froze. "Gravemind…you're dead." Cortana said as she glared at the deadly, misshapen, and horribly grotesque form of the Flood intelligence. "You would like to think that, Construct." It said coldly. That was when John bust into the room. She couldn't see his face because of the opaque visor but knew he was furious because of how fast he moved to engage Gravemind. The monstrosity just laughed and sent hordes of differing Flood troops at the Chief. John fought hard, but the troops were too much for the super-solider. "No!" She yelled as the troops stripped John of his armor. Then, an infection form leaped on the Chief as he screamed in pain. As John's body yielded to the Infection Form, it slowly stood and started walking over to Cortana "Chief, you don't have to do this!" She yelled at him as she began to cry.

As John bit her, she woke up in cold sweat and shook in fear at the terrifying movie that played for her sleeping mind. "John, NO!" She screamed in absolute terror. John was there quickly and held her close. "What the hell was that, John?" She asked as she looked at him fearfully. John looked at her in the eyes. "I'm right here, Cortana." He said gently. "I'll always be right here." He said comfortingly. He looked up at Frank. The man nodded and left. Cortana looked at John. "Gravemind…he turned you into a Combat Form, and you tried to infect me." She whispered as she shivered in his arms. John wrapped her tight in comforting arms.

Meanwhile, on Earth in the headquarters of the ONI, Lord Hood was being briefed on a recently deactivated AI, CNT 0452-9. "Another failed Halsey experiment…" He looked over the report Lucy sent him. "What you expect? Alyssa, bring up the last known location of AI, CNT 0452-9." "Right away, Lord Hood," the AI responded in a monotone voice as a star map with the last location where the AI's trace subroutine sent a ping. Lord Hood smiled. "You are mine, Secrets of the Ancients." He said with a laugh. "Gamma Company, the Earth needs you. Go to these coordinates. Recon, but expect resistance. I need you to recover some useful technology there." The squad commander nodded on the other end of the link. "Sir, yes, sir!" The commander turned to his troops. "We have a mission! Suit up!"

Cortana suddenly got a very bad gut feeling. "Doctor, I need a suit." Cortana said calmly. "I can't explain." She said as she touched a vacant Mark V Armor and felt her mind inhabit it. Then, Cortana formed the suit around her body and reentered it. "Let's party." She said as she armed herself with an M-9 and an MA5B. "We need to go back to the Forerunner Shield World where I changed." She told John, Fred, and Linda. "Lord Hood can't find the tech operational." Cortana told them. "If he does, no AI anywhere will be safe." She said with a shiver. They nodded. "Search and destroy," John said with a nod. "Alright, Spartans, mount up!" Linda and Fred nodded and started for their ships. "Blue Team, check in." John said over his radio. Acknowledgement lights winked on his HUD. "Rendezvous at coordinates," Cortana said with a stern voice as she sent the location to Frank and Linda. "Time to party," Linda said as she prepped her sniper rifle and went into Cryosleep.

On the other side of the jaunt through Slipspace, Blue Team woke up ready to rumble and touched down on the surface of the world a few minutes after they came out of Cryosleep."This is a beautiful place. Too bad it's going to be full of dead ONI goons in a few hours." Linda mumbled as she took to a hide about two hundred feet above the entrance of the underground complex. John got on his radio and laid out a plan. "Linda, you will stay up on the high ground and be our last line of defense and take out any that get past Cortana, Fred, and I. Understood?" Acknowledgement lights from the rest of Blue Team. "Spartans, let's move!"

The air was tense as Blue Team waited for the coming battle. Finally, Gamma Company came to them. "Damn knockoffs, they won't win." Cortana growled as she and John hid in a choke point and waited while Frank drew them in. "Persians and Thermopylae all over again." Cortana mumbled as she, John, and Frank turned on the one hundred plus Spartan IIIs and open fired. Without shielding but with Active Camouflage generators, the Spartan IIIs were a wave of refracting light. It was really insultingly easy. The few that did make it to John, Cortana, and Fred had the retort of Linda's sniper rifle as the last sound they heard. Cortana looked over in the middle of the bloodbath to see the ghostly image of Leonidas in hoplite armor nod at her. She returned the nod and smiled under her visor. In spite of her origins, she was a Spartan and would not let her brothers and sister die at the hands of this second rate goon squad. "Time to end this!" John and Cortana said in unison as they ran for the opening and threw an armload each of fragmentation grenades into the opening.

"No! Don't!" One Spartan III yelled at them as the entrance collapsed. With their objective gone, the Spartan IIIs were in disarray which made them easy pickings for their "obsolete" predecessors. About three minutes later, it was done. They could go back to Reach and relax. "Alright, report in." Cortana said. She was relieved when everyone's acknowledgement lights winked on. "Well done, team." John said through his radio. Over a private two-way communication, he told Cortana, "It is as if you were always one of us…" _My love…_ He doesn't say it. There's no room for love in Sparta.

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 **Author's Note: There is more to come. I don't like sour endings. Of course, you know that if you've read any of my other stories.**


	6. Lessons of the Past

Chapter Six: Lessons of the Past

Chief and Cortana sat in quiet contemplation before they entered Cryosleep. Once they woke up, Chief was greeted by the smiling and slightly pink face of Cortana. Her face was beautiful. John mentally traced the contours of her face and found his face forming a smile under his visor. "Good morning, Chief." She said as he stood. Though dwindled by John's size in armor, it was not Cortana, as far as John knew, who had heart problems when she looked at him. John's heart felt as if it could fly it was beating so hard and quick. To try and ease the tension in his chest, John went to his bunk and paced about the room in thought. _You are a soldier, John. Love is a risk and a distraction._ The super soldier thought to himself as he tried to figure out how to handle the attraction he had toward Cortana. In the back of his mind, John knew it was more than attraction but kept telling himself it was just to placate the ingrained soldier training.

John sighed and took off his armor. As the airtight seals hissed, John felt a familiar sense of vulnerability come over him but pushed past it. He needed to get out of his armor and walk around in his normal body for a little while. That's a strange way to describe it, but John felt like the armor was a second body for him. John sighed and changed into PT clothes. Then, he went for a jog to clear his head. While running, John saw Linda run up to match him. "What's on your mind, John?" She asked with a friendly tone. "What do I do, Linda?" He asked as he looked at her and kept running. "…about Cortana?" Linda asked with a grin. John sighed. "I'm a soldier, Linda." He told her. "I can't love." Linda froze at that and stared at him in mild shock. "That's utter bullshit, and you know it, John. We're not machines; we're human. That's why we are here on Reach. Here, we can embrace our humanity without the UNSC giving us constant orders to suppress our humanity in order to further the objective." She said with a sigh as John looked at his longtime friend with a sad look. "It's just I don't want to lose my training either." Linda laughed. "John, you have to know that love makes a soldier stronger not weaker." She said with a smile. John nodded and started to walk off the find Cortana. "Thank you for the talk, Linda." John said calmly. The girl nodded with a smile. "Go get her." She said with a smirk and a small laugh.

Cortana went to work in the lab to iron out her feelings about her Spartan. "Can I love?" She mumbled as she looked at the perimeter scanners and tweaked them a little to give them better functionality…and get her mind off him. It didn't work. Cortana couldn't get her Spartan out of her head. Cortana looked around in confusion as she thought, _He's my Spartan._ The thought surprised the woman and scared her slightly. _What's wrong with me?_ She asked herself as she heard Catherine walk in. "You need to talk?" She asked as the doctor noticed Cortana working like a dog to distract herself. "I guess I'm just confused." She told the older woman with a sigh. "What's there to be confused about? Both you and John are human." She said with a smile. This surprised Cortana. The surprise on Cortana's face made Dr. Halsey smile. "I'm just an AI in a human shell." The doctor shook her head with a smirk. "You're more than that, Cortana. You are human." She said with a smile as she hugged her "daughter" with a kind smile.

As Cortana pulled away from the embrace, strange readings could be seen from one of the perimeter sensors. "It looks like a time-space anomaly near the northeast corner of the base." The doctor said as she studied the numbers. Cortana smiled. "John and I will go." Cortana told the doctor as she went to prepare for the mission. _This will be perfect._ Cortana thought to herself. John walked into his room, and Cortana walked into the room just as John was taking off his shirt. She tried not to stare but couldn't help staring. The washboard was hard to ignore and brought a burning blush to her face. John noticed and smiled. "Hey, Cortana…" John said as he scratched the back of his head as his nerves made themselves known.

"Chief, the doctor has a mission for us." She said with a smile. John became serious in a nanosecond. "What is it?" He asked her as he turned his back to her and donned his armor. "A scouting and recon mission, there's a strange reading near one of the sensors, and the doctor wants us to investigate." She told him as they both exited the armory about fifteen minutes later. John nodded with a stern expression under his visor. "Let see what the problem is." John said with a bit of amusement in his voice. Cortana nodded and took the lead. The reading she got off the hand-held sensor made little sense. "That's weird." Cortana mumbled as she looked at the handheld scanner in confusion. "Chief," she called over her suit's radio. "This makes no sense. The scanner reads as if we're on Earth near the anomaly, but it corrects about a meter away from the rift." John cocked his head in confusion. "That's…impossible. Isn't it?" John asked. Cortana shrugged. "Theoretically, it is possible but not likely." She told him.

"Einstein thought that it would be possible to travel through time with wormholes. Maybe that is what we have here." She suggested. "Where does it go?" The Chief asked with an unseen curious look under his visor. "That's the million credit question." Cortana responded as she knelt and took a closer look at the rift. "Only one way to find out," Chief said as he walked within a few centimeters of the anomaly. Then, John turned to Cortana. "Are you coming?" John asked with a tone of worry in his voice. She grinned at him. "You can't be serious. Who else was going to be with you to save your ass when you get into trouble?" John smiled and felt a laugh hide in his throat. "Shall we?" John asked as he took her hand.

As they walked through the portal, John could hear someone speaking in a language he did not recognize. John mentally triggered the translation program onboard his suit and was not prepared for. "…Spartans! Prepare for glory." Daxos walked up to the man who John knew from History as Leoninas. John had an overwhelming urge to punch Daxos as he said, "Glory? Have you gone mad?!" John smirked under his visor as he and Cortana walked out of the portal and joined the group of Spartans. "There is no glory to be had now; only death, retreat, or surrender." The last word out of Daxos' mouth made John cringe. "Of course, that's an easy choice for us, Acadian. Spartans never retreat because we would betray our families by doing so. Spartans never surrender because we would shame our families. We fight and die to defend our home and keep our families safe." Leonidas growled as his eyes flared with anger in the campfire light. "This is madness. You will die. Persians march behind us as we speak, led by the traitor-"

John stood and walked up to the two men. "Ephialtes of Trachis." John growled out as his eyes flared at the thought of the archetype traitor under his visor. Leonidas smirked. "Who are you, soldier?" Leonidas asked. "Call me…Odysseus." John answered smoothly. Daxos stared at the armored stranger in slight fear. The thing that drew him was not the armor itself but the strange weapons he had on his armor. "WE will secure the aft position, sir." John told Leonidas. This brought a smile to the king's face. "We?" He asked with a smile. "Cortana?" John said into his radio. The girl jumped out of the top of a scraggy tree above them and landed next to John with flawless execution. "We…" She said firmly as the men looked at her in shock. "A woman?! We are truly dead. If the best you've got is a-" Cortana gripped Daxos' throat and picked up the poor excuse for a solder by the neck. "You were saying, Daxos?" She said with a deadly glare. "Sorry, ma'am. I was mistaken." Daxos said, clearly scared shitless by the show of strength. "King Leonidas, we will take position at your rear and keep those Persians bastards busy." John told him.

As the king nodded, John and Cortana returned the nod. Then, they took their position at the mouth of the goat path and waited. About zero five-thirty hours, John saw torches coming up the path. _Dumb sons of bitches,_ John thought as he readied his weapon. Cortana held her arm in front of his muzzle. "Slow down. We still have the element of surprise." John nodded and stowed his weapon. He then got closer as he signaled for Cortana to go up top of the battlefield and cover him with the sniper rifle she took from the armory. She gave him a silent nod and climbed higher up the cliff as the Persian army continued to advance on their position. John's muscles tensed, and he charged silently toward the oncoming horde. "It's party time!" John mumbled as he slammed into the "Immortals" and started to kick their sorry asses in furious "Spartan Time" hand-to-hand. The Immortals fell like dominoes under John's relentless assault. Many of them retreated at the "demon's" strength. "Run, you sad pussies!" John growled.

Cortana smiled. "Nice work, Chief," She told him. "We're not done yet. Time to cut the head off a snake." John told her as they marched back to the front. "John, if we don't survive this…" Cortana began. John smiled. "…we'll make it, Cortana. I can't let you die and not tell you how I feel." John's voice caught as his training fought to keep his mouth shut and focused on the mission. "I love you, too, Cortana." As the words came to her ears, Cortana felt a spike of adrenaline in her body. She looked through the scope of the rifle and grinned when she saw the massive throne that represented Xerxes' pride. "Pride comes before the fall, you bastard!" She growled as she waited for the king's forehead to get into position and squeezed the trigger. The battle froze stock still at the thunderous report of her rifle. Then, screams of fear and terror from the Persian army ran through its ranks as the king tumbled off his throne. The following slaughter was truly glorious.

"Nice shot, Cortana." John said when he and Cortana met up after the battle. "You weren't so bad yourself…Odysseus." She shot back playfully. "This'll be one hell of a story to tell back home." Cortana said with a grin as John took off her helmet then his. "Yes…it will." He said as he kissed her. When the two broke away, the scanner attached to Cortana's hip started beeping. "Here's our ride." Cortana said as she smiled at john. He smirked and replaced his helmet as Cortana did hers. "Damn, you must be a good kisser." John told her with a light laugh before they walked into the portal hand in hand.

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	7. Capture the Flag

Chapter Seven: Capture the Flag

On the other side of the portal, John and Cortana were met by the rest of Blue Team and the good doctor. Dr. Halsey was like a kid in a candy store as the old saying goes as she approached John and Cortana. "What was it like insides the anomaly?" Cortana glared at her "mother" with a glare that would make the Prophet of Regret fearful. "We are ok. Thanks for asking." Cortana said, mildly annoyed at the moment with the woman. Fred was a little better with talking than the doctor. He smiled, "What did you find? Did you see ugly three-headed beasts and a creepy guy in black robes?" Cortana shook her head with a small smile as John looked on, clueless. "No, we didn't go to Hades, Fred." Cortana said. John's voice rumbled out a reply. "We were sent to The Battle at Thermopylae." He told Fred as all the Spartans of Blue Team looked at the pair with shock plastered on their faces. "So…did you guys kick the Persians all the way back?" John shook his head. "It was a simple target assassination and mission to protect my brothers in arms." John told them.

As he relaxed enough to take off his helmet and put it in his designated barracks, John heard Cortana walk up to him from behind and spun around with his gun at the ready. "Easy, John." She said as she put her hands up to show him she was unarmed. He let out a sigh of pain as the spike in adrenaline left him. "What if-" John started with fear in his eyes but no other sign of distress. Cortana cut him off with a simple hand gesture. "John, for years you protected me. I don't think you could ever hurt me even with all the training you've gone through to shoot first ask questions later." She said to him as her felt a light pressure on his right hand. John felt a twinge of fear and pain at being unable to feel her hand on his. A hint of these emotions leaked out of the soldier's eyes. The emotions were not lost on Cortana, and she gently put a hand on his cheek. "I can write a program to tell the armor to disengage/engage and come apart on its own at your mental command, but I have to 'teach' the program how to properly disassemble and reassemble the armor." John went into panic mode. _Have her take apart my armor?!_ He thought. Vulnerable was not becoming of soldier, much less a Spartan, but that is exactly how John felt at this moment in time. Then, he felt trust push his fears to the side. "Alright," He said as he looked at the glowing blue eyes of Cortana. "I trust you." He said slowly.

With a smile and a gentle hand, Cortana began to skillfully remove the armor as John felt an annoying buzz come into being in the back of his mind. With sight worry, he looked at her. "What's that buzzing?" Cortana's eyes glowed intensely as she spoke. "That's me downloading the program into your neural interface." She said to the Spartan as he stood at attention out of habit. Cortana smiled at him. "At ease, Chief," She said to him. "I'm not your Commanding Officer. I'm your…" She paused for a moment and continued working but stayed silent as she searched for the right word. "…novia? No. La idioma es incorrecta." John went wide-eyed. He was no scholar with Spanish, but he knew enough. Cortana's accidental language swap made the Chief chuckle. "The word you're looking for is 'girlfriend'." He told her with a slight smile as she continued to remove his armor. Inside Cortana's head, she was as excited as any woman could be about the idea of a relationship. _John can't say it yet, but I know he will be able to say he loves me._ She stopped, put her hands on her hips, and gave him a mild glare any man would recognize as The "Dude, You're Screwed" Look. Though the glare was more playful than serious, it still made John uncomfortable. "Give me a break, Chief. I've only been human for about a week!"

Chief nodded and looked at the sun as it started to dip into the horizon. _It's almost chowtime._ He thought as he got up and started walking to the mess hall. Cortana smiled contently as she finished programming the armor. For as long moment, she looked over her work and double and triple checked the program's subroutines. Then, she got up and followed him to the mess hall for some food. The idea of eating was still new to her and gave her a little jolt of excitement as she sat down in a seat. It was different foods this time and made her smile as she envisioned all the possible tastes of each food. As the Spartans ate, a wary eye was always on their surroundings. Peace is powder keg. That was rule every Spartan learned over time.

As the super soldiers ate, a group of strangely dressed soldiers walked in the woods about a mile from the complex. They looked human, but…something was off about them. "Who are you?" Cortana asked with a worried look as she wirelessly tapped into the perimeter sensors. That brought all the Spartans to high alert. "We have three incoming bogies inbound." She warned as she and the other Spartans donned their suits and quickly readied for battle. As the Blue Team exited the bunker, they all watched the three from hidden positions across the makeshift base. John had an itchy trigger finger as he waited for the men to come upon them. John's glare was hard as steel through his visor, but the steel was galvanized with a new drive. Nothing was going to get to his family or Cortana. Then, he got a good look at the men and shock cracked his reserved expression at the sight of one of the men. Then, anger solidified on John's face. _You'll only get her over my lifeless body!_ cJohn vowed in his mind.

The person in the middle of two men in flanking positions beside him smiled as Blue Team swarmed him. "Hello, Sierra-117 and Cortana. If you will come with us please, we have some urgent matters to attend to." The man said. "Suck a phallus, you bastard." Cortana told him darkly with a growl. "Such a mouth on you…" The commander said as he tried to brush Cortana's face, but John grabbed the man's hand and crushed it. "Don't touch her!" John's glare only grew harder as the two men stared each other down. Then, John threw the man onto the ground and glared at him. "How dare you treat a superior officer like this!" He growled. "I am Lord Hood, Head of Naval Intelligence." John's expression wavered just a little but hardened almost as soon as it relaxed. John punched him in the gut. "You could be President of Earth, and I still wouldn't allow you to take her!" John growled as he placed an armored boot on the man's chest. Frank grinned under his visor. "A three man crew for Blue Team? Fucking insulting!" He growled. Lord Hood chuckled. He opened his mouth to gloat, but at the report of Linda's rifle, the smirk instantly faded.

Linda's voice ran through the comm. channel. "We have about fifty ODSTs coming in hot, Chief." Acknowledgment lights winked on as they prepared for the battle. The ODSTs popped up and received fire, but they kept coming like zombies. "What the hell is wrong with them?" Fred asked. John shook his head and growled. "Fred, you're looking at what will happen if we let Hood get Cortana! There's a new objective, Team. Protect Cortana!" Chief growled as he started to mow down zombie ODSTs like grass. "Chief, I can-" John didn't slow as his gun never stopped firing. The zombies swarmed him even as they dripped blood from missing limbs until Cortana could no longer see John under the pile of ODSTs. Cortana couldn't stand it any longer and went in with her MA5B blazing. "CHIEF!" Cortana yelled over the comm. She decapitated the zombies until John was freed from the undead dog pile and gave him a quick Spartan Smile. John couldn't help but gin as he took her armored hand. "Damn, I love you." He said with a grin hidden under his visor. The words made Cortana freeze.

John heard gears spinning as a machine warmed up behind him. Without a word, John dove for the dirt. As Cortana looked up she saw an electrified grapple zipped over them. Fred grabbed it and ripped the infernal thing out of Hood's hand and wacked the psycho on the head with it. The officer blinked in shock as what these soldiers were doing to him. Lord Hood, the highest officer in the UNSC, was being beaten up by subordinate men who were to take orders from him. "What is the meaning of this? Hand over the UNSC property. NOW!" He growled. John got in the man's face, removed his helmet, and glared at the officer in the eyes. "You attack my family, and you attack Cortana." He gripped the man by the throat as the Fleet Admiral struggled to breathe and gasped for air in John's iron grip. "One of those alone would be enough to get you a firing squad if I was in command, but you really have elephant nuts, sir. You did both." John said darkly as he threw the man as far as he could. There was an echo as a tree cracked in the distance in response to the force thrown against it.

Linda jumped down from her perch and sighed. "John, I know what he did to us, but he is the Fleet Admiral. If we don't send him back to Earth unharmed, suspicions will rise." John nodded. "Did you get visual on where he landed?" She nodded. "Fred, you're with me." She said as Fred nodded, and they went to retrieve Lord Hood. John was in shock as he walked over to Cortana. "I've never disobeyed an officer so blatantly." He said sadly. Cortana smiled at him, put her hand on his, and squeezed his hand. "That means you're learning there's more to life than just mindlessly following orders. You're learning to think with your heart. It just proves that the UNSC can't strip you of your humanity as they intended. That's nothing to be ashamed of, John." She told him with a kind smile. He gave her a thankful nod and somewhat timidly kissed her. John's brain spun at a million miles an hour at the deep kiss he and Cortana shared and only started to slow down when Linda and Fred came back as Cortana pulled away. "Wow." They said in unison. As Dr. Halsey started to patch up Lord Hood, the man smiled and taunted her. "Your little operation here, Hasley, will be reported to command and disbanded." Cathrine glared at the man. "How can you report something you don't remember?" The doctor asked before she punched him hard enough to cause amnesia concerning the duration of his stay in Reach. Then, the doctor finished patching him up. After Hood was loaded on the ship he arrived in, the doctor laughed as she noted in her records. "Aggressive cognitive recalibration successful on Patient."

 **Please Read and Review.**


	8. Desires of the Mind and Body

Chapter Eight: Desires of the Mind and Body

After Lord Hood's deportation back to Earth, John found a strong urge to protect Cortana deeply seated inside his being. It was this urge that made John walk up to Cortana one day at breakfast. "Cortana…" he said as he looked at her. His icy blue eyes were so intense. Every time she looked at her Spartan lately, strange sensations would rise within her. Now was no different. She only wished she could shut them down like a wayward line of code in her AI matrix. She tried to focus but found that almost impossible. "What is it, John?" She asked as she smiled at him. The Spartan steeled himself. "Because of that attack a few weeks ago, I would feel better if you were closer to me, ma'am." _Still as formal and knightly as ever…_ Cortana thought as she puzzled over why his concern for her made her feel good. She kept her smile and walked to him. Chief growled inwardly as years of training fought against a new desire to study Cortana's curves and chest. _Focus, John_. The soldier ordered. John's self-control red lined under the strain when Cortana hugged him. "I would like that, John." John nodded and went about his routine for the day. Cortana didn't see, but once John was out of sight, he rearranged his PT shorts because of the rod between his legs.

Fred smiled as he watched the two interact awkwardly. The tension between Cortana and Chief had everything so tight around the base. Something had to give sooner or later, and Fred knew a base evac would probably be called when the two finally gave into their urges. A part of Fred laughed as he imagined the duo's first encounter, but then, the rest of his mind squashed that train of thought. Fred and Linda drew perimeter duty that day, and it turned out Fred wasn't the only one who waited for the tension bomb to finally blow. "I heard John and Cortana are 'moving in together'." Lina said with a smile under her visor. "It's about time." Fred said with a sigh. "I'm going to go crazy if the tension continues for much longer." He said with a small laugh. "Yeah. Same here." Linda said. Her motion tractor pinged a moment later. "Two contacts at my two o'clock. Stay sharp." Linda warned. An acknowledgment light winked on her HUD. She nodded unconsciously and moved into the woods as leaves crunched under her boots. There was a rustling ahead, and Linda prepped her rifle. What she saw through he scope made the hardened solder freeze. _Hunters? What the hell are they doing here?!_ She thought. Linda was about to take the shot when she realized there was only one. "Fred, get your ass to my position ASAP!" She said over the comm. The Hunter's "brother" showed itself. The thing glared at her and powered up its cannon. "You're not getting me." Linda said calmly as she squeezed the trigger and watched the creature fall. The survivor of the pair roared and charged Linda, but before it could get to her, the report of an M-9 echoed through the air. A fraction of a second later, the thing fell with a groan. Fred smiled at her under his visor as the muzzle of his sidearm smoked with the heat from the round. Linda breathed a sigh of relief. "Thanks for the save, Fred." She said calmly. "It's time to report back." He responded. She nodded, and the team walked back to base. As they were walking out of the woods, multiple pings sounded on their motion trackers. "Ambush!" Fred yelled as he and Linda started fighting with their attackers. "I should have known there were more." Linda mumbled as the Grunts were gunned down easily. "I miss the days when we fought Innies." Fred mumbled as he took a plasma grenade from a fallen Grunt and stuck it to an Elite. The Elite roared angrily, but Fred just ignored the creature's protests and threw the creature into its comrades. "Down!" Fred ordered. Right as Linda hit the ground, the grenade exploded and sent a shower of plasma over the area. Fred and Linda got up to see sparking wires on a pole where a camera used to be. "Shit." Fred groaned.

John was running. As the air cycled in and out of his lungs, John felt his body relax and get into a soothing rhythm. He ran physically, but John also knew he was using PT as an escape. The trouble wasn't Cortana directly. It was the fact that with all his training, augmentation, and years of seeing women as nothing more than fellow soldiers; John found his body yearning for her. He wanted her and had no idea what to do with such desires, so he ran. Cortana studied the feeds from cameras around the perimeter and sighed right as a camera's feed stopped functioning. Dr. Halsey smiled and walked over to Cortana. "What's on your mind?" The older woman asked. Cortana quickly debated weather to tell or not. With a deep breath, Cortana turned in her seat and looked Catherine in the eyes. "It's John." She said with an almost defeated tone. "Trouble in paradise?" The doctor questioned with a small frown. "No…" she said with a light glare. "Every time I look at him lately, I picture him…" She trailed off and blushed, too embarrassed at the moment to continue. The doctor raised an eyebrow. "Nude?" Halsey suggested. Cortana's continued blush only served to answer her question, but the woman also shook her head in rejection of the suggestion. "There's that," Cortana admitted after a moment of silent thought. "Also, I see him smiling and holding a baby." She said quietly. Halsey smiled. This expression puzzled Cortana. "What?" She asked with a sigh. "It's perfectly natural to have those urges and wants." She said kindly. "Don't ignore them. If you do, it won't be a good thing." The doctor advised as Cortana nodded and got up. "I have to check on something." Cortana said as Halsey gave her an odd look.

Cortana suited up and headed for the spot where Fred and Linda reported an enemy contact. Once there, Cortana quickly replaced the camera. As she was about to head back, Cortana felt like she was being watched and crouched low to avoid being seen. That's when a blue Elite jumped out and grabbed her. In its growls and clicking, Cortana shivered. "You will make do for the time, human." The Elite told her. "I get quite lonely with no females to please me." He told her. Cortana gripped the Squidhead's arms and threw him over her head with a glare under her visor. "I'm not that kind of girl!" She yelled at him. The Elite did his best to smile at her. "A fighter…" he said with a gleeful tone. "…rare in females." Cortana glared at the beast under her visor. Then, she reached up and tore off one of his mandibles. The alien howled in pain, picked her up, and threw her into a tree. The impact jarred the neural interface with her armor loose and caused the armor to seize up. "Chief!" Cortana yelled frantically as she triggered an emergency homing program she installed by his armor.

John was walking back to the barracks when his armor caught him by surprise and formed itself around the soldier's body. Chief saw a weigh point on his HUD and glared at it darkly. "I'm coming, Cortana!" John whispered as he put all the power he could into running. Then, he saw her under an Elite with portions from her armor torn off and thrown to the side. John roared and tackled the Elite. "Get away from her, you piece of shit!" John growled as he started beating the Elite into submission. The Elite grunted and let out a strange sound. John took off his helmet and glared into the Elite's very soul through his eyes. Then, John snapped his opponent's neck with a mighty punch to the throat. As the Elite's head went slack and fell over, John quickly found and replaced all the pieces of Cortana's armor. Then, he gently helped her to her feet. "Did he…?" John trailed off as his voice trembled with rage. She shook her head and hugged him tight.

Back at base, Cortana and Chief were inseparable. Fred misread that and asked, "So, you finally did it?" John walked over to his fellow Spartan and grabbed him by the collar. With seething rage, John-117 growled lowly. "She was almost raped by a hostile." Fred's eyes went wide. "I-I didn't know man!" John roughly put Fred back down and looked at Cortana in worry. "Take her to your room, John." The doctor said. "I'll be in shortly to check on her." John nodded. "Yes, ma'am." Cortana looked at John's visor as she silently pleaded for him to take off the helmet. "I need to see your eyes, John." She said quietly as she looked up at him. John smiled and gently took his helmet off. Then, he looked at her with a gentle smile. "Thank you." She said as she hugged his armored body. "Thank you for everything." She began to drift off. John smiled and picked her up gently. _Old habits die hard._ He thought with a little smile. Cortana was still not used to sleep, so it regularly surprised her. Now was one of those times. John gently aided her to her bed. When he moved his hands out from under her, John heard Cortana plead. "Chief, don't go!" John got out of his armor and laid down next to her in his PT clothes. "I would never." He said as he unconsciously pulled her close to him and dozed off himself. "I will always protect you, Cortana." He told her before sleep completely took the soldier. In her office and the only one who remained awake, Doctor Halsey logged the events of the day with curiosity. "I wonder if John has any idea what Cortana wants." She said to herself as she logged the data.

John woke up in the night to the sound of Cortana laughing. "Careful…Jeremiah." Cortana said sleepily as the smile only grew on her face. Her arms moved in slight motion. "There…" she said as John saw she looked as if she was holding a child. John couldn't help but smile at the seen. _She would make a wonderful mother_. He thought to himself. That thought brought another to the soldier's mind. "Would I be a good father?" He mumbled to the night with a sigh as he rolled over and drifted back to a rough sleep with a final promise, _If you want children, I'll give them to you._


	9. The First Time

Chapter Nine: The First Time

(Pure smut. Please skip this chapter if you don't like that)

John woke up with a surprise as he looked at the foot of his bed. Cortana was happily blowing his member. John's eyes got huge at the scene before him, and the soldier in him tried to get him to stop her. The man in John enjoyed the sensation as his girlfriend sucking him off. The neglected man let Cortana continue at her leisure. _Damn._ John thought. _She definitely knows what she's doing._ He was surprised by this. Then, he remembered how much of the Internet was porn and chuckled softly to himself. Cortana's tongue moved around John's rod with slow and careful movements. Cortana was quite pleased with herself as she felt John harden further in her mouth. His large manhood threatened to choke her as she pleasured her man, but she liked the feeling of the large phallus inside her mouth and grew wetter as she thought of him inside her between her legs. She let out a moan at the thought. Then, she felt his MAC gun prepare to fire and stopped. John couldn't help it. He glared lightly because he didn't want her to stop.

She smiled and crawled up to him as her bare breasts moved along his chest. "I don't want you to go off just yet, John." She explained as her soft hands traveled up his chest and cupped his face in her hands before she kissed him hotly. John's arms wrapped around her and held her gently as they kissed passionately, Then, Cortana positioned herself so that she sat completely naked on the bed with her legs spread wide open. John felt his mouth water at the scene. She was soaked, and damn it, he did that to her! John felt a sense of happiness at the thought of being able to make Cortana so wet. "I wonder if you taste as good as you look." He said with a smile. Cortana let her left hand rub herself as she smiled at John. "Come over and find out, Big Boy!" She teased. John didn't have to be told twice. He bent down and began to eat Cortana out. The girl's body shivered and pushed all sorts of sounds from her mouth as he ate. Cortana smiled and let her head lay back as her hips began to buck against John's face. Soon, the world faded away to just the sensation of his mouth going to town on her slit. With a gasping scream, Cortana climaxed.

John smiled into her slit when he heard that. He moved slowly up her body to give her a brief moment to come back from the orgasm. Then, he kissed her and let Cortana taste herself. Then, John nibbled on her neck and smiled as she moaned into his ear. _That's right,_ John thought. _I'm here to send you to Luna, Cortana. Spartan's don't half ass anything._ Next, John gave attention to each breast as Cortana bit her lip at the sensation. Finally, John placed the tip of his member into Cortana's soaked slit. Then, he waited. After about thirty seconds, Cortana looked at him and pleaded, "I need you, John." John nodded and wrapped his arms around his love and gently slid himself inside her tight slit. Cortana gasped at the feeling of him inside her and shivered. He was larger than she expected, and that made this slightly uncomfortable for her. John must have sensed her unease because he took his time and let her hole a just to his size before he went in completely. She smiled at him, grateful to him for being understanding. Then, John pushed further and felt something quickly tear. Cortana's breath caught in surprise at the sudden pain in the mist of pleasure. John stopped when he felt Cortana tense up. He saw tears standing in her eyes and kissed her gently. John was truly worried about her. He thought he'd gotten too carried away and hurt her badly. This of course, made him shrink. Cortana felt this reaction and looked at him. "John, I'm ok." John gave her a skeptical look. "John, please, don't leave halfway because your scared." John looked at her again. When Cortana nodded that she was 100% alright, John slowly began again and was soon back to full extension. After that little scare, he quickly got into a steady rhythm. It was as if his body was on autopilot. All John had to do was keep the "cruise control" steady. Riding John like a horse by now, Cortana could feel herself building up again and stuttered, "F-faster!" John complied and felt as if he was going to burst, but John held it in until he felt Cortana's hole start to convulse. John finally allowed his body to seek relief as Cortana screamed in ecstasy underneath him.

Both spent, the pair held each other and looked into the other's eyes. "That was wonderful, John." Cortana said as she snuggled into him happily. John was surprised. From the tales Marines wove about their sex life that John had heard, their women were rarely contented. He looked over and kissed her. "I'm glad you enjoyed it, Cortana." He said, truly happy he was able to satisfy her. They laid there and basked in the aftermath of their first lovemaking session for a few more moments. Then, the base started to come alive outside the door. John and Cortana shared one final kiss before they reluctantly got up for the day.

 **Please Read and Review. Do you want this to come to head with Cortana finding out she's pregnant later? (I'm out of ideas for the story.) Also, this is my first attempt at a sex scene. No flames, please.**


	10. Notice to Readers

Dear Readers,

I apologize for not writing on this story in a while, but the truth is I was grieving for the two greatest characters in-game: Cortana and Chief. I've watched these characters grow from Reach to when Cortana dies. I can no longer write for them because 343 Guilty Spark has mocked their memory by turning Cortana evil and making Chief an outdated piece of junk to be thrown out like trash! No, that Forerunner _thing_ is not Cortana. The woman would NEVER betray John! I would rather she died in Halo 4 than have to suffer through that!

343 owns the Halo game series and all characters therein. However, I will refer to the company as Guilty Spark because they were meant to safeguard Halo but betrayed the Reclaimers. Guilty Spark can leave the universe to ruin, but I will honor the Sierra-117 and Cortana by leaving them where they are in my story: happy and in love.

BenxGwen Lightning Warrior


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